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Segment 1
Hello Good evening, everyone I'd like to welcome you all to the December 10th meeting of the Berkeley City Council and Call this meeting to order.Can we start with the roll call, please? Okay.
Thank you Councilmember Kesarwani.
Here.
Taplin.
Present.
Bartlett.
Here.
Tregub.
Present.
O'Keefe.
Here.
Blackabee.
Here.
Lunaparra.
Here.
Humbert.
Present.
And Mayor Ishii.
Here.
Okay, quorum is present.
Thank you.
So typically we would read the land acknowledgement statement at the beginning of each monthly meeting but since this is my first meeting, I'd like to ask that we do a land acknowledgement statement again and from now on we're gonna be switching off and have different council members do the land acknowledgement and we're gonna start with Councilmember Kesarwani.
Thank you very much, Mayor Ishii.
The City of Berkeley recognizes that the community we live in was built on the territory of Huichin, the ancestral and unceded land of the Chochenyo-speaking Ohlone people, the ancestors and descendants of the sovereign Verona Band of Alameda County.
This land was and continues to be of great importance to all of the Ohlone tribes and descendants of the Verona Band.
As we begin our meeting tonight, we acknowledge and honor the original inhabitants of Berkeley, the documented 5,000-year history of a vibrant community at the West Berkeley Shell Mound and the Ohlone people who continue to reside in the East Bay.
We recognize that Berkeley's residents have and continue to benefit from the use and occupation of this unceded stolen land since the City of Berkeley's incorporation in 1878.
As stewards of the laws regulating the City of Berkeley, it is not only vital that we recognize the history of this land, excuse me, but also recognize that the Ohlone people are present members of Berkeley and other East Bay communities today.
The City of Berkeley will continue to build relationships with the Lujan tribe and to create meaningful actions that uphold the intention of this land acknowledgement.
Thank you so much, Councilmember.
I'd like to move us on to ceremonial matters, and I'm going to pass it off to Mark, our City Clerk.
Okay, thank you, Mayor.
So at this time, we will administer the oath of office for newly elected and re-elected members of the City Council and Mayor.
Okay, so at this time, I'll have you stand and if you turn on your microphone and point it up, it'll pick up some better audio.
And raise your right hand and repeat after me.
I, state your name, do solemnly swear or affirm that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States and the Constitution of the State of California against all enemies foreign and domestic that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the Constitution of the United States and the Constitution of the State of California that I take this obligation freely without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties upon which I am about to enter.
Congratulations.
Thank you so much, and thank you to those who are here to witness the swearing-in.
I want to give our new council members and also re-elected council members time to say a few words, if you'd like.
Council Member Blackaby? Sure, I'll be brief and we said a little bit this Friday night, but I just want to let everyone know here I'm so honored to be joining this body, to be joining the City Council with this wonderful group of colleagues who all want to serve our community and make Berkeley even better.
At a time that we're entering some rocky waters nationally, I do believe that what we do here locally really matters because government can be a force for good, empowering us to join together as a community to solve problems that we can't solve individually and to extend a helping hand to friends and neighbors that need our support.
The people of Berkeley deserve a world-class local government that delivers top-notch public safety, affordable housing, vibrant public spaces, and safe transportation for everyone that uses our streets and sidewalks.
They deserve a government that is data-driven, accountable, and transparent, and local leadership that stands up to defend our progressive values.
And I'm looking forward to doing all that work together.
In particular, I just want to thank the voters in District 6 who've placed their trust in me to be their voice on the City Council.
It's an honor and a privilege that I don't take for granted.
One thing just to think about, the people of District 6 have had only two council members over the past 32 years, just two, 32 years.
Susan Weingraff for the previous 16 and Betty Olds for the 16 years before that.
These are two trailblazing, outspoken, courageous women who were passionate advocates for our district and dedicated to constituent service.
They've set a super high bar, and I will work every day to live up to their examples.
So again, I'm looking forward to joining our new mayor, all of my council colleagues, our city manager, Paul Budenhagen, and our terrific city staff to tackle the challenges ahead and help Berkeley live up to its fullest potential for everyone who lives and works here now and in the future.
Thanks again for the privilege of serving.
Thank you so much, Council Member Lockheed.
Would anyone else like to say a few words? Go ahead, Council Member Humbert.
I want to personally say a quick but hearty congratulations to our new council members and those who've been re-seated.
And to say a hearty welcome, once again, I've welcomed them several times to our new council members.
And I want to thank the city clerk and the staff for all the work on this election.
Berkeley really puts our staff through trials with our many measures, and that includes council making a lot of demands when it comes to crafting the ones we place on the ballot.
I'm not going to address our ballot measures, but finally, I want to say a special congratulations and welcome to Mayor Ishii.
Herding council cats and other creatures isn't always easy, but I'm excited for your leadership and really looking forward to working with you.
Vamonos.
Thank you.
I'd also like to join my colleague in welcoming our new colleagues.
It's nice to have a full house.
Once again, it's been a long time.
And all of you, I've known you all many years, all of you.
It's really amazing to see this.
It's like one family all coming home to roost.
And I welcome you.
I'm going to help you support you.
I'll be there for you and just welcome aboard.
I'm so proud of you all for doing it.
And my mayor, Madam Mayor, wonderful work.
You are a trailblazer and so proud of the work you've done already and look forward to helping you succeed and help us all see together.
Thank you so much to the voters.
District three.
Thanks again for your support.
I'm there with you.
Reach out any time.
Thank you so much.
Yes.
Council member.
Just briefly, I want to say I'm a child of Berkeley.
I was born at Alta Bates Hospital.
I've lived here almost my entire life.
And frankly, I plan to die here.
This is my home in a very serious way.
And I love this community and I love this city so much.
And I just want to say this is this is the honor of a lifetime to be able to serve in this way.
And I want to say thank you to the voters of district five.
And thank you to all my colleagues for welcoming me.
And I'm really looking forward to working with you all.
And I hope to do you proud, Berkeley.
Thank you, Council Member Toplin.
Thank you.
Thank you to the voters.
Welcome to the members.
Welcome to the new mayor, Mayor Ishii.
And let's get to work.
Yeah, I also just want to thank folks again for being here this evening and to say that even if you didn't vote for me, my job is to earn your trust.
And I look forward to being in touch with the people of Berkeley and hearing from you.
I'm very much looking forward to doing this job.
It's been an absolute honor and everyone has been incredibly welcoming and supportive.
I look forward to moving forward as a council together.
So thank you so much.
I thank you.
I also want to acknowledge that this is the last meeting for Deputy City Council Managers, Latonya Bellows and also Ann Cardwell.
So I wanted to give, I believe, Council Member Toplin first an opportunity to speak and to make some comments since I'm new and didn't get a chance to work with you much.
Thank you so much.
And good evening, everybody.
On behalf of the council, Madam Deputy City Manager Bellow and Madam Deputy City Manager Ann Cardwell, thank you so much for your years of service to the community, city and people of Berkeley.
We have benefited so much from your unflinching responsiveness and your executive approach to city administration.
And although it is with a heavy heart that we must say goodbye for now, we are so excited for you and your journey in Emeryville.
Not too far away.
So hopefully you won't be gone too long.
But honestly, thank you so much.
And I've loved working with you.
We've all loved working with you and and we wish you the best.
Thank you.
Thank you so much.
And I'm not actually sure if Ann's here, but I'm going to pass it over to our city manager to say a few words as well.
Thank you, Mayor Ishii.
I want to say a few words about our retiring deputy city manager, Ann Cardwell, as well as our moving to be Emeryville City Manager, Deputy City Manager Bellow.
So to both of you, my profound thanks for your hard work, for your leadership, for your compassion, for your passion and for all of the many things that you've done to make Berkeley a better place for everybody who lives here.
I know you're going to do the same in Emeryville.
I know that we will stay connected as two cities working together.
So I thank you for all of that and also thank Deputy City Manager Ann Cardwell for her years of service here to the city of Berkeley.
She had the internal service department, so she wasn't quite as visible, but that was really the backbone of what made the city work also.
So my sincere thanks to you also, Deputy City Manager Cardwell.
Thank you so much for those comments and actually, I'm going to send it to, ah, we are going to send it back to you for city manager comments, actually.
Thank you, Mayor Ishii.
I don't really have any comments other than I do want to pull item number nine from the consent calendar.
Other than that, that's it.
Thank you so much.
And at this time, we're going to take public comment on non.
Oh, sorry.
My apologies.
Our city auditor also has some comments.
All right.
Good evening.
And I wanted to congratulate our newly elected mayor and our newly elected city councilor.
Members and our reelected city council members, and I also wanted to just send best best wishes to Deputy City Manager with Tonya Bello and and Cardwell as well.
Thank you for your service to our city and to this council and to our city manager, our city attorney and other folks on the city staff.
I look forward to working with you all to ensure Berkeley services are run efficiently, effectively and equitably tonight.
I just wanted to talk a little bit about some of the audit recommendations, updates that's on the agenda.
A key part of our work together is ensuring that departments implement these recommendations outlined in our audits and I just wanted to share some of the progress with you.
Our, you know, with the departments and to the public.
I wanted to share that for the departments have provided updates as information items on today's council agenda, including the 1st update on restaurant inspections on the restaurant inspections audit that that was released in July, the public and provide comments during the consent calendar on all of these items.
So I'm going to just share a little bit about each item item number 22 is the restaurant inspections audit where the department has been understaffed and the program did not meet targets at the time of the audit release.
When this report was released, city council requested that the environmental health division provide an update to our recommendations in December, given the serious public health risk identified in the report to fulfill that request, the division shared an information item and to demonstrate that they've started or partly implemented 7 out of the 8 recommendations proposed in the audit.
Our report found that longstanding staff vacancies impacted program operations and left too many restaurants and other food facilities uninspected in 2023.
According to the department's response, the division should have finished inspecting all high risk food facilities by November, 2024 their target is to now complete the inspections by the end of the fiscal year.
The department has also requested that the department's staff vacancies be completed by the end of the fiscal year to complete the inspections by the end of this calendar year.
For all low and medium risk facilities.
We're pleased to share the environmental health division is also staffing up.
The division has filled one inspector position and is in the process of but of selecting a supervisor to hire in the short term they've entered into a contract with California Association of environmental health organizations.
The division has also requested that the department's staff vacancies be completed by November, 2024.
The division has also reported that they are planning to upgrade its current database to enable public access to facility inspection results.
Next I wanted to share item 24.
This is the report.
Rocky Road Berkeley streets at risk and significantly underfunded and fleet replacement fund is short millions.
The department is currently in the process of evaluating the fleet replacement fund for the streets on it.
The department plans to engage a consultant to conduct an annual inventory of deferred street maintenance needs and estimated associated costs.
The funds from measure at the F which just was just approved by voters.
We'll further support the goals of the department.
The department has also completed an assessment of the fleet replacement fund for the fleet replacement fund system in spring of 2024 and the department's updating replacement costs in the new system to account for all associated expenses such as personnel and customization which was not included before public works also completed an assessment of the charging infrastructure, the new fleet replacement fund system.
Item 23 is a audit title domestic violence response Berkeley needs a comprehensive policy to support city employees and their update HR shares that they will continue to make progress on compliance with the updated policy.
The department is currently in the process of making revisions to the title scope and definitions and this updated policy will soon be submitted to the city attorney's office for legal review.
HR is also planning to incorporate staff training for compliance with the updated policy into a redesigned supervisor training program.
In addition to the updated policy the city attorney's office is policy to drop recommendations that are more than 5 years old which this year includes this particular audit.
And fortunately since the last update the department has not implemented any of the open audit recommendations aim to improve coordination prioritization and enforcement of fire enforcement.
The department did not implement these recommendations but they've also shared that although these recommendations are dropped the department is working on a number of them.
And they've stated that the staffing challenges and competing priorities, especially during the pandemic impacted the department's ability to implement.
So I just want to say thank you to the city attorney's office for the work that they've done and I just want to say a few words about the important steps departments have taken and really kudos to the departments who've taken steps to address these.
And where there's still more work to do and again I look forward to working with this new City Council with the new mayor and for the people of the city.
And the other 5 speakers are the other 5 speakers all draw the names for the in person.
It's stated on the agenda.
So the 5 names.
So the 5 names for the in person.
So the 5 names for the in person.
Aiden Hill.
Promise marks.
And again most side.
Thank you.
Siemens Okay, there you go.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
I've lost like 40 pounds, the cholesterol went from 224 to 188.
The glucose went from 111 to 77, the heart rate 104 over 68 and mental well being let me tell you, you focus on that ball.
I played varsity tennis doubles for Berkeley High we were the Northern California champions.
I don't want to play tennis I'm lugging around that tennis court, but the pickleballs hand fast.
If you play ping pong softball whatever it's great.
But you only have Cedar Rose with one core open play and McKinney so you need to start looking into putting more pickleball on the tennis courts because everybody's playing it's exploding.
Thank you.
Thank you.
All right, next speaker.
Any, any, any order.
Thank you.
I want to thank the mayor and also all of the folks that have been reelected.
Ben Terry.
And I even got my little, I even pulled it up.
So I want to thank everybody because I'm be working with you.
You're going to see me a little bit more.
Okay.
District one council member.
Okay.
District one council member.
Okay.
District two.
Terry.
Okay.
District two.
Brent Blackaby.
Is that correct? Okay.
Of course district three.
All right.
District seven, Cecilia.
Okay.
And district eight mark.
Okay.
And district four.
Okay.
Okay.
Sorry.
They don't tell you all that, but.
I'm here to actually say thank you to all of those that have worked to be able to help keep black repertory group theater in order.
And I say this.
Thank you.
Thank you.
I say this with a contrite heart.
That beautiful woman over there.
She's the best, isn't she? And she's done a great job working together with Paul and working together with Ben and Terry and all of you to be able to keep things going.
And so.
Give them the, give them the jingle.
And was that.
Promise marks.
Yes.
That's okay.
So you've exceeded your time by 46 seconds.
Okay.
We'll make it quick.
She loaded up the Christmas tree.
She moved it in reveal.
And I did it all wrong.
Cause I was rushing loaded up the truck and she moved to Emory.
No swimming pools.
But like Terry Tappan said, you can come on back.
We just want to give her some flowers.
And we want to thank you for all you've done.
Let's give her a big round of applause.
It's on your bellows.
Hi, good evening, everyone.
My name is Jessica Bravo and I'm here as a representative of the Berkeley homeless union.
I want to thank you.
I want to extend my congratulations to the new members of the council and the mayor and take this opportunity to introduce our organization to you, which represents the collective voices of Berkeley's and house residents.
The Berkeley homeless unions was funded to address the urgent and systematic challenges facing our in-house neighbors.
Our mission is to ensure that they're most impacted by housing and security have a seat at the table, a voice in shaping policies and a network of support to advocate for the dignity and rights.
Most recently we have been active at the second street encampment where the threat of displacement moves heavily over dozens of residents.
Our union has been working tirelessly to bargain for a fair and just closure of this encampment where no one is left behind.
We have advocated for clear timelines, equitable shelter offers and ADA accommodations for residents with disabilities.
Our goal is to ensure that it is handled in a way that prioritize safety, health, and humanity of those affected.
But despite these efforts, we've been met with silence.
We have been repeatedly requested to meet with city officials to discuss the needs of our house communities and collaborate on solutions.
So Berkeley has a long and proud history of championing equity justice and collaboration.
It is our hope that this council will continue that legacy by engaging with us directly.
We are not here to obstruct, but to offer solutions.
We believe that when on house residents are included in the decision making process, the outcomes are more compassionate, effective, and sustainable.
Thank you.
I want to congratulate you, Mayor Ishii, and may this be a new beginning with collaboration in the city and hearing our voices.
I'd like to yield the rest of my time to Gordon.
Hi, my name is Gordon Gilmore.
I'm a representative for the Berkeley Homeless Union, and I too want to extend my congratulations to you and to the newly elected members of the council.
I'm hoping we can work in dialogue.
As of now, mechanisms are set in place in the municipal code to allow for the bypassing of folks' rights.
And as such, unhoused folks need collective representation to advocate for the respect of their individual rights.
These are often overlooked in city interactions with the unhoused community, the right of association being one such.
But more importantly, the right to be free from needing to live in a state of hyper-vigilance for fear of state-enacted harm.
The 4 a.m.
sweep of old city hall this morning represents one such cause of fear created by mechanisms of the state.
And numerous members have spoken to how this fear will prevent them from enjoying the upcoming holidays.
Please enter into dialogue with us so we can end this reign of fear.
Thank you.
Hayden Hill is the last speaker.
Good evening.
Esteemed council members and community members.
Tonight, I want to speak about displacement.
but Dade hills the last speaker Good evening esteemed council members and community members Tonight I want to speak about displacement specifically in the context of people's park The decisions made here about its future are not abstract.
They're deeply personal and profoundly consequential for many First understand that people's park is more than just a physical space It's a national landmark a refuge and a living piece of Berkeley's identity It shaped the experience of countless people serving as a sanctuary for those in need and a symbol of resilience for our community second consider the human impact of your.
Segment 2
The redevelopment of People's Park, the displacement of unhoused folks at Old City Hall.These are real people's lives, and they should be treated with respect.
How are you going to make sure that people are housed? Or how are you going to make sure that people at the roadway in, where UC Berkeley sent unhoused people, are going to be formally housed? I give it to you to answer these questions, and I thank you for your service.
I really hope that we can work together as a community, and you listen to the people entirely.
Thank you.
Thank you all so much for your comments.
I just want to say I spoke with some of the activists outside earlier, and offered that my office be willing to meet with you all.
I know we'll be in touch, and thank you very much all for your comments and for being here this evening.
I really appreciate you being here.
Okay, and we'll go to the public commenters live on Zoom.
Yes, for non-agenda.
Okay, Ben Gerhardstein, you should be able to unmute and speak.
Good evening.
Thanks for taking my comments.
I'm Ben Gerhardstein.
I'm with Walk, Bike, Berkeley.
We believe in making Berkeley a wonderful place for walking and biking.
And I want to welcome this new council, both newly elected members and returning members, and I just want to say that I'm very excited to work with you, and that we can be bold, and we can deliver on what Councilmember Blockabee said of making Berkeley a city that has a government that is world-class in delivering the services that we all need and deserve, including making our streets as safe as possible.
So welcome.
Thank you for your service, and let's get to work.
Okay, thank you.
Next speaker is Kaye.
K-A-Y-E.
Hello.
Thank you all for hearing my comment.
My name is Kaye.
I'm a resident of the City of Berkeley and a health educator.
While I can't speak as eloquently as other folks who have spoken earlier, I just wanted to express my deepest pleasure with the removal of the encampment on 2nd Street today.
These folks are my neighbors.
They are community members, and they've been treated like they're discardable.
So please, as you move forward and make decisions as a new council, as a new mayor, please put people first.
Okay, thank you.
Next is Lisa Teague.
Good evening, Council.
I'd like to speak as a member of the Berkeley Outreach Coalition.
We want to welcome new council members and returning council members and congratulate our new mayor.
And we do hope that we can work together in the coming months.
I was going to ask the mayor to engage with the Berkeley Homeless Union, but it appears that that is going to happen.
I would also like to take the time to condemn the 4 a.m.
sweep at Old City Hall.
That's never the way, y'all, especially when promises had been made to house those people who were leaving voluntarily that day.
Thank you again for hearing my comments and welcome.
Okay.
Next is Betsy Morris.
There we go.
Thank you very much.
I just needed to unmute.
Betsy Morris.
I live in District 2 and I'm the co-convener for the East Bay Gray Panthers.
I also want to second what several speakers have said.
These sweeps are cruel and unusual punishment.
I know the Supreme Court and the governor have encouraged you to take this kind of action.
And I continue to hope and work that we will find a way to remember for the citizens, for the people who do live in Berkeley, who consider themselves residents of Berkeley.
These are our neighbors.
These are our elders.
These are the vulnerable, marginalized people and also people who are just trying to work.
And by living in vehicles, by camping, a number of people in West Berkeley are displaced workers.
And yet we don't really know those things.
And I really encourage us all to get to know our unhoused neighbors and begin to understand that we cannot be a good, we cannot be a virtuous city until we can include our own and make peace with that.
With that in mind, I really want to encourage everyone to look into the National Vehicle Residence Collective and I'll finish that.
Just say there are resources for us to learn to get to know who it is that doesn't have a home, doesn't have a house.
Thank you.
Last speaker is Chelsea.
Yes, I am here.
Hi, I'm gonna, can you hear me all right? Yes.
Great.
I'm going to get right into it and I'm very happy with some of the changes going on in the city.
First thing, that fire alarm issue, not okay.
It is the fire department's responsibility to keep citizens safe.
My building has expired fire alarms and carbon monoxide detectors that I have back and forth emails with my landlords gaslighting me telling me that it's perfectly acceptable to have expired fire alarms.
It's not cool.
And the self audit is, is frankly unacceptable as well because they're doing themselves and not turning it in.
Part two and why I'm really here, I would like to have a motion to remove the Hawkins-Costa Act for the city of Berkeley.
For those of you that do not know about the Hawkins-Costa Act, it was 1995.
It was two male landlords who are also legislators.
To this day in California, over 25% of our legislative body are landlords.
And we do have a slumlord problem in Berkeley.
We need to be looking out for the people that are marginally or barely housed and people who are in a generational gap that they can't afford houses.
I would like to have a motion to remove it for the city of Berkeley, because the big issue is the rent control stays with the unit.
If we remove the Hawkins-Costa Act, we can have rent control that stays with the unit.
So if I move out and it's $2,000 and you want to move in, that stays at $2,000 or $2,050 because the rent control would be there instead of person to person.
And that is invaluable to a community of people who are struggling to pay rent or get in.
Furthermore, they're within that act because this is a..
Okay, that's all non-agenda speakers.
Thank you.
Thank you all so much for your comments.
I'm looking forward to offering more opportunities to speak with my office directly.
So I hope that you all don't feel that you need to be here for that specific reason, that you have more opportunities to come speak with me and folks in my office.
And I also believe that I left out a speaker earlier, so I apologize.
We have the East Bay Regional Parks Director, Elizabeth Echols.
I just want to make sure, City Clerk, that it's okay if I recognize her to speak.
Yes.
Thank you.
Hello.
Good evening, Council Members, Mayor Ishii, staff, and community members.
My name is Elizabeth Echols, President of the East Bay Regional Park District Board, which represents about 3 million people in Alameda and Contra Costa counties.
And as someone who has called Berkeley home since childhood, I'm pleased to be here this evening to congratulate our new mayor, Adina Ishii, along with all of the new and re-elected City Council Members, Council Members Blackabay, Bartlett, O'Keeffe, and Taplin, on your successful elections.
Mayor Ishii, I'm excited to see the new energy perspective and leadership that you bring to your role as mayor.
You and the City Council have a tough road ahead, as others have noted, and yet I am confident that together you'll succeed in making Berkeley a shining example of what a city can be.
I look forward to working with you on goals that the City of Berkeley and the Park District share, including addressing the impacts of climate change, equitable access to parks and recreational programs, safe transportation, and protecting public open space for everyone to enjoy for generations to come.
Thank you for your service, and thank you for the opportunity to be here tonight.
Thank you.
Thank you, Director Echols.
Thank you.
I'd now like to move on to the consent calendar.
Council Members, are there any comments? Okay, thank you very much, Mayor Ishii.
I wanted to—actually, I didn't get a chance to say just congratulations to you, Mayor, our first Asian-American woman mayor in the City of Berkeley's history.
I want to acknowledge that as an Asian-American woman also, and I want to congratulate Council Member O'Keeffe and Council Member Blackabay.
I'm looking forward to working with you and so happy that you're here on the Council, and congratulations to our re-elected—our old hands.
Young at heart hands.
And I just look forward to working with this new body and thrilled to get started.
So I don't have any comments on consent items.
I did want to thank the City Auditor for her comments on the information reports, and I would like to request that we move the restaurant inspection audit status report to action, and I'll see if two other colleagues would like to do that so we can get an update from the Director of the Department on how things are going with the restaurant inspections.
Thank you.
Are there other Council Members who will join? Okay.
Okay, Council Member Tragob and Bartlett will join in moving that to action.
Are there—say again? Okay.
Other comments? Thank you.
I also want to congratulate our new and returning Council Members and Mayor, and I'm looking forward to working together.
I also want to address the 4 a.m.
sweep of the encampment at Old City Hall.
I said this at the September 10th meeting, and I will say it again.
Sweeping is not an effective solution to homelessness, and shuffling people around who are already traumatized is not only ineffective, but it is also antithetical to our city's commitment to a supportive and compassionate response to homelessness.
If our goal is indeed to support people and get them housed, which I do believe is our collective goal, then we have to find better ways to meet the unique needs of our diverse community.
There were 20 police officers at the sweep this morning and zero social workers or mental health professionals.
I want to urge my colleagues to please meet with our constituents who are suffering as a result of systemic inequity and our policy choices that direct our future decisions.
Thank you.
Thank you.
I also would like to be recorded voting no on Item 14 and would like to ask for unanimous consent to move Item E, Bicycle and Pedestrian Access on the Richmond-San Rafael Bridge from the Action Calendar, to consent.
Thank you.
Were there other comments? I have a few comments, but I think Council Member Kesawani was asking you to ask whether there are any objections to Council Member Lunaparra's request to move the bike letter item to consent.
Yes.
Are there any objections? Thank you.
Yes, Mayor, I have just a few comments.
One is with respect to Item 18 on the consent calendar, and it has to do with the new schedule of fines and late payment penalties for parking violations.
It's adding some penalties and fines for parking within 20 feet of a crosswalk or an intersection ahead of our red curbing, all of those areas.
And I think we should go ahead and pass this tonight, but I had a question for staff, and I don't know if staff is available to answer it.
Looking over this item, I noticed we have something like 35 different dollar amount levels just for base fines.
For example, between the values of $40 and $60, there are 12 different fine levels.
Is this something we could do an item on to potentially simplify and consolidate, or are our hands tied by requirements that our fines be amounts that are precise to the dollar based on quantified impacts? So I don't know if there's any staff member from Public Works who could answer that question available.
Our Public Works Director, Terrence Davis, is on the call remotely.
He's unmuted, so he can respond to your question.
Yes, good evening, Mayor, Council, and community.
Terrence Davis, Public Works Director.
So, to the question, I did confer as we were putting this item together very closely with our police department and Chief Lewis, and we certainly can take a look at the series of fines and fees that have been put before you in that schedule that are tied to the municipal code to take a look to see if there's options to either consolidate or look at other options to ensure that we're following best practices that other municipalities are as well.
So, that's certainly something we can take a look at.
Some of this work started early as the reimagining public safety effort, so we have a framework to kind of take a look at these, so we can certainly look at them and bring them back.
Okay.
Thank you so much.
I appreciate that.
And I want to join with Council Member Kesarwani if there aren't already three votes to move the restaurants item from consent to action.
We have three votes.
We have three votes.
Okay.
Thank you.
And now, since the bike item is on consent, I just have a couple comments I'd like to make about that.
I'd like to thank Council Member Lunapara for bringing this forward.
If our region is going to meet its climate goals, live up to its principles, and be an example for the rest of the country, we need to take bold steps to make it easier and safer to use non-automotive forms of transportation.
This particular project is beyond Berkeley's voters, but since this bridge is a regional transportation link, it still affects us and our residents directly.
We just received a letter today from the Bay Area Council that I find problematic.
Bay Area Council is purporting to speak on behalf of the minority and working class population of Richmond, but the City of Richmond's government has already weighed in on this, requesting that the bike lane stay open on weekdays.
I don't want to move backwards to accommodate auto drivers.
We need to be serious about mode shift.
The climate demands it.
And there is no opportunity here for safely mixing bikes with cars on that bridge.
Even the most avid cyclist is not going to ride the bridge without the safety of a protected bike lane.
I'm hoping that working with our new council members, we can bring forward some items for Berkeley that have the same energy as this one.
There's no reason Berkeley can't be the Paris of the U.S.
with a high-quality network of safe bicycle infrastructure and Mayor Ishii following in Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo's steps.
And I'm hoping this resolution represents just a small initial movement in that direction.
Thank you.
That's all I have.
Thank you, Council Member.
Are there additional comments? I think our machines are not working.
I see, actually, Council Member Blackby.
I'll be brief.
Yeah.
First, on the consent calendar, it's just I'm glad to see several items to promote the arts here in Berkeley.
Art and public spaces, as well as to study the economic impact of the arts in Berkeley and pandemic recovery.
So I'm looking forward to that report and seeing the results of the report.
Also appreciate the auditors comments earlier, and in particular, the fire department audit.
I know we're at the end of the five year follow up period, and so not necessarily obligated to report back again on the audit.
But I know there are a lot of those recommendations that are in process.
So I just wanted to confirm with the city manager that we could get maybe a six month off agenda memo with an update, even though, again, we're past the five year window.
But I think there are a lot of those recommendations that we're eager to see progress on and would love an update in about six months.
Sure, that's no problem.
Okay, thank you.
Council Member Trager.
Thank you so much, Madam Mayor.
First, I wanted to just join in the chorus of the congratulatory chorus to say congratulations, and it is exciting and inspiring to be part of a council where First Story is being made today.
Congratulations on your momentous victory, and thank you for being willing to serve.
And congratulations to all of the new and re-elected members of the council.
Some of you I've already worked on in this space before, and I look forward to doing so again.
I wanted to, on item 18, just follow up on the question from my colleague with another question.
We did receive a communication today in support of this item, and asking about what kind of educational opportunities there might be before we get into punitive measures.
But if staff can provide a brief answer about what kind of educational processes will be in place first before these fines are exacted.
Sure, thank you for the question, Council Member.
A couple things.
One, we're developing, or we have developed, a list of the most dangerous intersections in the city.
That will be the ones that we start with the red painting, so we've overlaid crash data with all of the intersections that the city has.
I'll share that out, too.
I'll share that out with some other interested folks, and if they have additional information that they want to share, that would be welcomed.
To your question, the plan is to put out information over our social media, through the city's websites, which we'll share also with Council Members, and you can amplify those voices.
It would be helpful.
And to start off with a two- to three-month period where the goal is not to start with citations, but with education and warnings.
And then after that period of time, move into citations after that.
But there would be a two- to three-month period of informing and educating the public about this whole process in the state law.
Thank you so much.
And then in reference to item E, which is now on the consent calendar, I just wanted to thank the engagement that we have received from many members of the public, whether you were for or against this resolution.
I read your comments and letters closely, and I don't dismiss the legitimacy of the opposition to this item.
I will be voting in support of the consent calendar, which includes this item.
I had an opportunity to ride my bike across that bridge a couple of years ago as part of a 350 Bay Area bike ride-along across all three bridges we did.
I think we tried to do half of the Bay Bridge because only half is open right now.
I understand that, well, ultimately this is going to be the decision of a regional body, which represents numerous stakeholders across all nine counties in the Bay Area, and we are just one city.
But I wanted to lend my voice as part of the nine-member City Council in support of this item because I agree with the contents of this item.
We are in a climate emergency.
Any mode shifts that can be done to move people to more climate-friendly modes and away from privately-owned vehicles is helpful to the extent – and I did read the comments to the contrary – to the extent that some believe that this pilot has failed.
I believe that it is our collective responsibility to ensure its success.
I am just one council member in one district, but I think I share this desire with all of my colleagues to do whatever we can to support making it safer, easier, and more accessible to shift into that mode of being able to use a bike and transit to not just within Berkeley, but outside of Berkeley, using those much more climate-friendly forms of transportation.
Thank you.
Thank you, Council Member Tragob.
I see that Council Member Apif would also like to speak.
Yeah, thank you, and I'm happy to follow Council Member Tragob's comment because I would like to add my support to the bike lane item.
And in addition to the important climate goals that it serves, I want to also call out that it's very, very important to have bike access from the East Bay to Marin for equity reasons.
I think the fact that BART does not go to Marin and there's very limited other public transportation access, it's really, really important as a government body that we make sure that there's good equity in transportation throughout our region.
So, another reason to support it.
Thank you, Council Member O'Keefe.
I'd now like to move on to public comment on consent calendar and information items only, and I will have the clerk.
So, you're going to speak.
Please line up against the wall over here.
You can get a sense of..
Hi, I'm Margaret Fine again, and I'm here tonight for Monica Jones, who unfortunately couldn't be here, is such an extraordinary community member and leader.
You'll see an invitation in the back for a bike giveaway, and thank you, Ben, did an emergency legislation like the SCU and is ahead of the curve in ensuring bike equity by providing opportunities for children who may not have a bike by giving them away.
And he has put together a resolution to authorize the expenditure of surplus funds from the office, expense accounts of Marin City Council for donation to Lights of Tomorrow, which is the nonprofit that Monica runs at Malcolm X School with twice a week, twice a month for boys, twice a month for girls, in order to bring role models so these children can have opportunities because they know they can do these things.
She's brought fire department people.
She's held cleanups down by the bay.
I mean, this is a woman who has, like, created a village in order to make this a much more equitable city, and I hope that every council member can give as much as they can so that these children can have bikes for Christmas or whatever holiday they celebrate.
Thank you.
I just was going to comment that that's an emergency item.
So just so you know, it will technically be on our agenda.
So I have to vote to it.
Yes, yes.
Good evening and welcome, Madam Mayor.
So wonderful to see you up there and all the new council members.
Welcome.
My name is Ilana Auerbach and I am wondering who was it.
This is with regard to item number 14.
Thank you.
Council member Luna para for not supporting 400000 more dollars to the Berkeley Police Department.
There were dozens of police officers there at 4 a.m.
this morning.
And so I know, Madam Mayor, you were running on bringing transparency and accountability to our city council.
So who approved that? I went over to City Hall this afternoon, spoke with Andrea Henson of Where Do We Go?, who's an attorney there, and she was speaking with Peter Radu and other people in the city.
And so we need to understand who approved that because that wasn't what they were talking about with our unhoused neighbors, with the homeless union and also with the advocates for our unhoused neighbors.
So that's transparency and accountability.
And we need to get to the bottom of that.
So this kind of thing doesn't happen again.
Thank you.
Thank you, Madam Mayor.
Hello.
Congratulations, Mayor Ishii.
Thank you, Madam Mayor.
I think we should be ending the contract with them.
Thank you.
Thank you, Madam Mayor.
Thank you, Madam Mayor.
I think it's self explanatory why I'm against further business with that company.
Thank you, Madam Mayor.
Thank you, Madam Mayor.
Thank you, Madam Mayor.
Thank you, Madam Mayor.
Thank you, Madam Mayor.
I think we need to address homelessness issues by actually working on housing people.
That is the only way to solve the issue of people being unhoused, not pushing them around and traumatizing 4 a.m.
sweeps.
Thank you.
Hello, my name is Lauren good and I'm a lifelong Richmond resident and I'm commenting on agenda item as well as a policy associate at the Bay Area Council for homelessness.
Segment 3
I'm a lifelong Richmond resident and the Richmond Bridge issues have affected me and my community personally.Firstly, I'd like to say that if you are voting in favor of the resolution, the permit amendment is supported by the Richmond NAACP, BATA, MTC, the Marin County Board of Supervisors, the Contra Costa County Board of Supervisors excluding Supervisor John Joy who hasn't taken a position due to his position as a BCDC Commissioner, the Northern California Carpenters Union, and the Marin Association of Public Employees, and over 17,000 Bay Area residents who signed a petition in favor of the bridge permit amendment.
Public policy has to be based on the facts, which demonstrates the following.
Biker usage of the bridge is slim and 80,000 cars go across the bridge daily.
This is directly impacting minority communities who do not have access to bikes and cannot bike on the bridge due to how long the commute is.
I myself have biked and rode on the bridge specifically, and it's a hard ride, but I do support biking.
This amendment isn't against biking.
The bike lane would remain open on Friday through Sunday.
This is directly impacting a minority community and is supported by the minority community of Richmond and many other organizations.
Thank you for your time.
Good evening and welcome, new mayor, beautiful to see you, beautiful to see you.
Of course, I was disappointed, Mayor Hageen, and this is the council people.
They were horrible, the way they treated my company.
I opened our company in 1973 with $1,000 loan from Cooperative Union, people have been here.
Within five years, while I'm a PhD student at Cal in the field of nuclear engineering, our company did over $15 million a year.
I'm sorry, can you just tell me which item you're speaking on? Item C, item C, Durant Mall.
We applied there four years ago.
Our application was approved by both consent item C, the Channing Durant Mall telegraph.
You have it? Yes.
Okay.
So four years ago, Mayor Hageen, the demolition of our building on telegraph, Mayor Hageen promised a place, so he would love to have you.
Next day, Mr.
Garland, I guess I have to have more time for the fact that we have waited.
And an employee, probably corrupt, I know why she is corrupt, would application on hold for four years.
We have said we'll pay five years in advance, we did everything.
We have a lot to say.
I opened the business in 73, by 78, over 100 well-paid Americans.
Paid millions over taxes, including many millions in the city of Berkeley taxes.
The way, you know, I'm sorry, the cover page, as you see it, is very tough.
It is, because we've been waiting four years, eventually to give us some unknown company that manufacture jewelry, which is obscene.
And our friend Bartlett knows, he brought them in.
Now, what I'd like to say, for sure, is that if you look at the first page, just cover it.
Please conclude your comment.
I will, I will.
Mark? You're a minute over.
Okay, just a minute.
Okay.
Second page, we're about to file a claim against the city, legal claim against the city, for multimillion dollars, because of the terrible action.
What Hageen did, and the city council did, really was a crime against our company.
I'm sorry, sir.
You're over your time.
Okay.
I want to make sure we have time for the other comments.
Yeah, just please pay attention to the three pages I gave you.
Thank you.
Would you promise that? Thank you so much.
I have them right here.
Thank you.
Okay, thank you very much.
I'm sorry if it's tough, but if you have, we lost probably a couple billion dollars in the last three years.
We need to go forward.
Thank you.
I'm sorry.
Thank you.
Go ahead.
Thank you, thank you.
It's nonsense.
It's not fair.
You're welcome to the rent.
You're welcome to the taxi.
Yeah.
Hi, again.
My name's Aiden Hill.
I'm a resident of District 7.
I wanted to speak briefly about consent calendar item C, the lease agreement with Dorothy Day House.
District 7 residents deserve spaces where we can dance and play pickleball in large open fields, spaces that bring joy, foster connection, and address our community's climate goals.
Parks and open spaces are not just about recreation.
They're also a central infrastructure for resilience.
That's where Dorothy Day comes in.
Dorothy Day House has been tremendous in at least my work with Food Not Bombs, which is a loosely international organization that's like people like you and me, who believe ending hunger is necessary, that food is a human right.
And Dorothy Day House has been at the forefront of that in Berkeley.
We've had so many connections with them, and in my personal work as a case manager, I see how especially unhoused people need those services now more than ever.
And it's nonprofits like Dorothy Day House who are picking up the slack and making sure that people are fed.
So I really do hope you approve this, and I want to commend Dorothy Day House for all the work they've done in Berkeley.
Thank you.
MS DAVENPORT START BOOK Good evening.
So item C, I'll ditto what the previous speaker said.
But I also want to comment on the sweepstakes because you really are traumatizing folks.
People are unhoused, and then they have to wake up at 4 a.m., whatever time you decide, with police presence, no mental health services, and no compassion or empathy.
How would you like it if someone came knocking on your door at 4 a.m.
to manage you to move all your stuff and get the hell out? That's what they do in Israel, you know? It's not real, I mean.
And it seems like you're taking on the same kind of tactics, and that's not okay.
I also understand that the walk buzzer in front of Old City Hall when we crossed the street at 3 a.m.
was going on.
The buzz was going on from 3 a.m.
until dawn.
And that's another tactic of the IDF, to have drone sounds, which is equivalent to the sound of the beep from the walk signs.
And that's not okay.
That's torture and unusual punishment.
So be kind to our unhoused neighbors and stop the sweeps and free Palestine.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
And welcome to the new council members.
My name is Andrea Pritchett, and I work with Berkeley Cop Watch, and I work with a lot of organizations.
I'm a teacher here in Berkeley.
I'm tracking item number 14.
I see that we're spending the proposal is to spend money on hybrid police patrol vehicle supplies.
What I'm here to address is this idea of money for the police function.
Because part of the reimagining public safety process that the city went through a couple years ago was talking about what is public safety.
Public safety is endangered when a rain comes, and all the unhoused people get wet, and their blankets are wet.
And they risk dying of exposure as somebody did in Willard Park in late November.
And that's what I know of.
I imagine there's others, or there may be others.
And when there's a rain, when there's an atmospheric river that comes, it's like an earthquake.
It's like any other disaster.
We have to be prepared for it.
Why do the poor people in our city not qualify for an emergency response? Because we have the most fragile population, unfortunately, lives, as you saw, in those tents in front of Old City Hall.
The special care unit, I've come to you before talking about its deficiencies.
Dr.
Carlos Flores is the head of it now because he's with Bonita House.
He has directed, and I know this because I was there for 5 o'clock, 6 o'clock in the morning, when a psychotic woman who is incontinent, who is disabled, who walks with a walker, who was huddled in her tent.
Who do I call in this town? Who do I call for help? I did everything I could.
I took her to my house.
I bathed her.
I gave her new clothes.
But I can't, I can't, I don't have the resources to help her the way she needs to be helped.
And I called the special care unit this morning when there was a bulldozer, there was a bulldozer going back and forth 2 feet from her tent with no regard.
And I'm sorry, but I have the memory of Rachel Corey actually is on my shoulder.
And I'm thinking, what if this guy makes one wrong move? This woman in this tent is going to get crushed.
She already had it.
Okay.
Well, she's got 12 seconds because she's already 48 seconds over.
Okay, you got, okay, you got, we'll run, let it run for 15 more seconds.
Flores told me that he, oh, I'm sorry.
But when I called Dr.
Flores after the rain came, he told me, do you realize you're calling me on my day off? When I called this morning, I got, for the SCU, this is our emergency response.
At first I was told we can't come there.
Who exactly? We're not allowed to come to Old City Hall.
Eventually they told me that Dr.
Flores had said, we are specifically directed not to go to encampments without police, which completely undermines this $5 million project that we've all been, so many of you campaigned on, your desire for a 24-7 emergency response.
Then when I called back and I tried, well, I said, look, this woman right here needs help.
Please come.
He said, we're on a training from 8 to 12.
Would you expect, if you called the police, if you got that kind of an, I don't know what's funny, but right on.
Right on.
That's the four minutes.
Thank you.
I've called you so many times asking for your help.
Thank you so much for your comment.
Today is my first meeting, and I promise you that I will make time to speak with all of you about this issue.
I really appreciate you bringing this, and it's absolutely heartbreaking, of course.
If someone came and woke me up at 4 a.m.
in the morning, I wouldn't be happy about it either, so I understand that.
I want to say that there needs to be more communication and coordination, and that those conversations will be had with my administration.
Thank you so much for your comments.
That's Ms.
Pritchard, ladies and gentlemen.
She's been fighting in this community for a long, long time.
A long, long time.
Folks, my name is Nathan Mizell.
A few of you may recognize me from the long-ago eras of 2020 and 2021 when we worked with reimagining public safety.
Before I get into any of that, I want to congratulate you, Mayor Ishii, on your election, your victory.
I think it truly represents so many Berkeleyans new hope, and there are many people I trust truly that say to me, they believe you are that person that can put the city back on track.
So I look forward to supporting you in your work.
Congratulations, Council Member Blackabee.
Council Member O'Keefe, of course.
Re-election of the council members.
Council Member Bartley, you're the old statesman now.
I got to recognize Wally as well.
Not too old.
Okay.
Sorry, was there an item? I'll go to item 18.
Is that the police item, or is that the..
I'm already out of time.
Can you borrow me a minute? I very much appreciate it.
Thank you.
So, yeah.
Let's talk about..
No, no, no, folks.
I'm sorry.
There's a different item on the agenda.
Let's talk about fines and fees.
Yes, fines and fees.
I appreciate council's concern.
I heard it from Council Member Hummer and other council members as well.
That was one of the things we worked on in reimagining, and I believe currently the proposal to hire additional folks to look over claims and to really just remodel and completely change our fines and fees structure, I believe is a deferred budget proposal waiting for you perhaps next year.
So I think, like a lot of different ideas in reimagining, we're still hoping to see that work forward.
But I also want to be clear, for myself, obviously, safety for renters, their protections, police accountability, these are my big issues, as you folks know.
I will continue to advocate for them.
And I think the good news is there's a lot of room for us to work together.
I know it seems like a lot in the last year, maybe that hasn't been true.
That's still true to me.
That's why I worked on a task force for a year and a half to get ideas, and I want to continue in that work.
And just so you know, I've been at law school, right, at Hastings for the last, you know, I should say UC Law SF, formerly Hastings, don't get mad at me.
So I'm working on that.
That's why I haven't been here as often.
But I'm still in this work.
I still care, and I'd love just, you know, an opportunity to speak with all of you as we go into the new year and the work we can do together.
Thank you.
Hi, just wanted to talk really quickly about item number C.
I'm not here to oppose the lease for Doherty Day House, but I do want to raise some serious issues about the services in Berkeley.
My day job is as a journalist, and I actually requested through a public records request the grievances that people have filed about Doherty Day House in their shelters, and I was not able to get these records because the city does not even collect this information.
Like you don't even know what grievances are happening in your shelters because the city does not request this information.
So I just want you to know that, you know, that is a priority, that you should know what is happening in the places that you're funding.
Doherty Day House is a longstanding homeless service provider, but they also need checks and balances, which they don't have at this moment.
We just keep funding everything that they do, but we need checks and balances.
Thank you.
I want to talk about Item 14 and spending money on the police, like up to $400,000 or something.
I want to talk about honor because the police are supposed to be honorable, and I entered into an agreement with the city of Berkeley where I was told that 40 people accepted shelter because of outreach and that they wanted to partner with us and that no sweep would happen at Old City Hall until everyone took shelter.
Now, that doesn't mean they had to accept it, but that they could use their own autonomy and agency to go inside.
You could understand that I was very disheartened this morning at 4 a.m.
when the city showed up with like 25 police officers and 25 public works folks to remove people after I shook Peter Radue's hand.
That's old school.
I said, let's partner.
Let's help people.
Can I have an extra minute, Paul? Thank you.
I said, let's work together.
Let's get people inside.
It's wintertime.
And then I've said numerous times, including to Paul Budenhagen, that where do we go with pay for the cleanup of Harrison Street to help folks there? We said that numerous times.
Let's help people this winter.
But what happened this morning is our most disabled were left out.
SCU refused to come.
We were out there in the morning.
I stood in front of someone's tent because they were going to take everything she had, and she's severely mentally disabled, African-American.
I had been telling the city about her for weeks.
There's too much to get into.
What I think needs to happen is we need to have an investigation because this is affecting my reputation with the folks on the street.
I went out there, and we talked about people going inside and getting the trust from the city of Berkeley and giving that.
Because to get trust, you have to get it.
To get people inside, there has to be.
Can I have another minute? Thank you.
Honor, bravery, to stand up when everyone is against you, when they don't like seeing people, to stand up for people's rights, and courage is important.
And what happened, because I came here, and I talked to everyone about having a partnership, a start again.
And on our mayor's first day, I bet I'm correct that no one told you they were going to come out at 4 a.m.
because you were at our dinner, and you've been out at our camp, and our goal is to get people housed.
That's what everyone says.
I was told that the city of Berkeley was intaking five people a day.
That's what I told people out there.
And this morning, people were screaming.
Everyone in the shelter woke up because police were outside.
Lights were outside.
I was being told to move people's things in the pitch dark.
I had a 76-year-old woman who just got discharged from the hospital.
This isn't over.
And I'm not threatening to be frivolous about it.
When I shake someone's hand, I believe in honor.
You all know me.
I don't come up in front of you just to wave my arms around.
Not that people do that, but I'm saying I'm just speaking for me.
I was given a promise that everyone there would be housed or have an offer of shelter before this camp was cleared, and they showed up this morning.
I honestly didn't think it was going to happen because I believe in handshakes.
I believe in honor, integrity.
Your word means something.
And I put everything in it.
I worked every single day.
Everyone in our organization, the Berkeley Homeless Union and others, worked every single day to get these folks housed.
And now they're traumatized.
There are still two women who are so severely disabled that they are laying on the grass in psychosis, not because they should be arrested for 5150, I'll end it, but because they need help.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Before you speak, I just want to say I was not aware, but I don't think that that's an excuse.
I should have been aware.
And so I do want to just say that I, as your mayor, feel that it's my responsibility to know about these things and to be able to continue to build trust between the city and the people.
Mayor, thank you for your comments.
Okay, do we start now? Okay.
So on C, Dorothy Day House, I always support the good work of Dorothy Day House, but job development for the unhoused should go beyond selling thrift clothes, which is not a sustainable way to survive or become self-sufficient.
So we really need better job development in Berkeley.
In terms of number 12, I'm glad to see the city addressing Sacramento.
Cars just race through those LED lights.
There's been many accidents.
It needs to be looked at very carefully.
And as far as the SEU, it needs to be – it is a failure on so many fronts.
I can't possibly begin to go into it here, and it just needs to be redesigned.
We need to acknowledge that the intent was good, but it needs to be completely reworked.
But there's more than the SEU.
The city of Berkeley has a mental health full-service homeless partnership team that the MHSA funding plan came to council – I will wrap up – but it came to council for approval and was approved by the state, and it talks about physically going to the encampments to provide mental health services.
But they're never at the encampments.
So we need to also look at the mental health homeless full-service partnership team so that they start providing services.
Hello, everyone.
My name is David Green.
I want to speak on number 14 and where we spend money and where we don't.
For the last month or so, I've been going around in my own pickup truck and helping out at some of the homeless encampments where they will have garbage bags ready for me to pick up and haul off so that their place can look decent and they can feel good about where they're staying.
I also happen to be a practicing psychotherapist, so just as my personality, no matter what I do, I end up talking to people, and I can piggyback or vouch for what everybody else is saying.
There is nothing, well, I shouldn't say nothing.
There's something dangerous about all of us.
We can all have problems and be a little grumpy sometimes, but these people want to be talked to.
They want to be cared for.
They want to be listened to.
There's nothing scary about going into these encampments and talking with folks.
One woman I was talking to this morning at 6 a.m.
after a lot of the encampment had been cleared was that she believed in her heart of hearts that Berkeley PD was really the people protecting her, and she was sure that these sweeps were going on because of Trump.
Trump was sending people in to do these sweeps.
Berkeley and Berkeley PD had her back.
Please conclude your comments.
So this is a real moment, like somebody mentioned earlier, where there's going to be trouble nationally, and we need to decide which side we're on.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Hello, everyone.
My name is Jacob.
I didn't know that I was going to come up here, but my witness compels me to come and speak, both my witness of being a new resident of apparently District 2.
I just learned that today.
So Councilmember Taplin, hey.
I have only lived out here for two months now, and in those two months, I have spent about equal time both sleeping in my nice overpriced apartment and then also going around and either helping out or sleeping in tents.
I've been doing this because I recognize that apparently the city of Berkeley, which I had esteemed previously because I believed it to be representative of the values that we have on these flags here, believed it to be representative of the values and the history of radicalism and equity and change, has decided that it needs to criminalize its own neighbors, its own people.
And I find that unconscionable.
And I find it unconscionable that we would spend $400,000 on giving more money to the police when we have people who need housing, when we have people who need help.
Thank you.
Hi, I'm Todd Jersey.
I am a local architect, a business owner down on 8th Street in Gilman.
My wife and I own an office condo there.
And I wanted to first congratulations, Mayor and Council, to thank Rashi for her work in dealing with the encampment down there because it's, you know, it's really sad to hear the 4 a.m.
thing that's just completely out of balance.
Sorry, just are you speaking on an item? I'm speaking on 14.
14.
And so, like everybody else.
But I did want to just put in there's an overwhelming presence for homeless care here, and that's important.
It's also really important to hear how much the businesses are struggling down at Harrison.
And people are intimidated to come forth and speak about that.
I will be reaching out to you, Mayor, to talk about it.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Is that the end of our comments? In person.
Any other in-person speakers? Okay.
We can move to the speakers on Zoom.
The first speaker has a phone number ending in 937.
You can press star 6 to unmute.
Okay.
Maybe we can come back to them.
Chelsea.
You should be able to unmute.
Hi.
Yes.
To go with all the topics that are going on.
My background is as an ICU nurse and a nurse that works in the community, what's happening with the homeless people.
It's not right.
I do want to know from a show of hands from the city council, how many of you are familiar with Hawkins cost to act.
I'm sorry.
Could you tell us which item you're speaking on? It relates to the homelessness issue in the situation because as a city, do we only care about people if they're unhoused and homeless? There's no item on the consent calendar.
I'm going to interrupt and say that earlier I made comments that I will be meeting with folks here.
I've already spoken to folks before this meeting and will be meeting with them.
And so this is something we are taking seriously.
And also this is time for comments on the consent agenda as well as information items only.
Thank you for letting me speak.
Thank you.
Okay, and we have next.
We have Robert Prince.
Thank you.
And hello, Berkeley council members.
Welcome to Mary.
She and council members.
This comment is about the Richmond center felt bridge path resolution.
Special.
Thanks to council member for offerings item and to customers.
My name's Robert Prince.
I'm an advocacy director with Bay.
You don't know.
We're an over 50 year old grassroots nonprofit organization serving country cost now in the counties immobilized by bike to build thriving communities.
We also coordinate locally with in Berkeley with many partners and friends that walk by Berkeley who are very happy to can successfully on measure FF.
I appreciate your support on this resolution.
Look forward to taking it to the Bay conservation development commission in 2025.
Help inform their decision on the matter along with existing support from Richmond city council, Albany city council, West Contra Costa transportation commission, more than 70 community organizations, including the Sierra club, save the Bay, the trust for public land.
More than a dozen community serving Richmond groups and too many more mentioned.
Unfortunately, there's still infrastructure gaps on the marine side that biking and walking access pathway and extremely insufficient public transit connections.
Ultimately, the bridge congestion is a lot of comments.
Thank you.
Thank you.
I'm going to move on to the next slide.
This is a timeline for the issue of lack of workforce, housing, construction in county, leading to people suffering through mega commutes from deep East country Costa.
So we hope we can help set an example for county, followed by prioritizing saving continuous active transportation infrastructure, public transit investments and housing affordability needs.
Thank you.
Segment 4
I'm going to pass it over to Councilmember Bartlett, who has an emergency item.Thank you, Madam Mayor.
First off, Monica, if you're listening in the hospital, please get well.
Parents are with you, and the work you do is so important.
So Monica's group is called Lights of Tomorrow, and they're giving bikes to kids.
And it's coming up on the 18th, and this is our last meeting.
We learned about this the other day, so this is our one chance for me to donate money from my office to help them get bikes to kids, and the opportunity for all of you, should you care to, to contribute as well, if you accept it.
Okay, so I'd like to move to accept this measure for a second.
Second from Councilmember Tregub.
Okay, to add the item to the agenda, Councilmember Kastorwani? Yes.
Taplin? Yes.
Bartlett? Yes.
Tregub? Aye.
O'Keefe? Yes.
Blackabay? Yes.
Lunapara? Yes.
Humbert? Yes.
And Mayor Ishii? Yes.
Okay, the motion carries.
The item is added to the agenda on the consent calendar, and will be adopted with the consent calendar vote.
I'm going to recognize Councilmember Taplin.
Thank you.
I would like to contribute $500 from my dealership account.
Our office would also like to contribute $500.
Councilmember Tregub.
Thank you, Madam Mayor.
I'd like to contribute $100 from my discretionary account.
Councilmember Humbert.
Yes, thank you, Madam Mayor.
I'd like to contribute $300 from my discretionary account on this item.
Councilmember Lunapara.
Thank you.
I would also like to contribute $300.
Councilmember Bartlett.
You're next on the queue.
I'd like to contribute $100 to the item.
Thank you very much.
Councilmember Blackabay.
I'd like to contribute $250 from my office budget.
Okay.
Thank you, Madam Mayor.
Thank my colleagues here.
Oh, thanks.
Yeah, me too.
Same as Brett.
Do you want to say how much that was? $250.
Thank you.
And I'd like to give $500.
It's written here, but I have to state it as well.
And so, also thank you all for contributing.
These bikes go a long way.
A lot of kids are not going to have big Christmases.
And like we heard tonight, the sad stories we've heard about people having rough circumstances right now in our midst, some of them are children.
And so, let's forget about one thing tonight.
Thank you.
Thank you so much.
I'd now like to have the clerk take a roll for the consent calendar items, please.
We need a move approval of the consent calendar.
Second.
Okay.
To approve the consent calendar, Councilmember Kastorwani? Yes.
Taplin? Yes.
Bartlett? Yes.
Traigub? Aye.
O'Keefe? Yes.
Blackabay? Yes.
Lunapara? Yes.
Humberg? Aye.
And Mayor Ishii? Yes.
Okay.
Motion carries.
All right.
Thank you.
All right.
We have one action item as well, which is because we moved number 22 from information reports to action, which was done successfully.
So, I'd now like to go to action calendar and take public comment on the action item.
Is there any public comment? This is item 22 regarding restaurant inspection audit status report.
Is there any public comment from in-person attendees? No? Okay.
I don't see any raised hands on Zoom, so there are no public commenters for this item.
So, I'd now like to turn it over to Councilmember Kastorwani to make a public comment on the action item.
Usually, it's after discussion.
Thank you.
Thank you for your suggestion.
Yeah.
Council comments.
Thank you very much, Madam Mayor.
I want to thank the auditor again for the report on this and Director Gilman.
I see you're on Zoom for us.
I want to thank you for your division's work in addressing the audit recommendations.
And I wanted to have this discussion because I had done a referral suggesting that we look at the possibility of doing some kind of independent analysis of whether the City of Berkeley should continue to exercise this function of conducting the healthcare facility inspections and potentially look to alternatives.
And so, I understand, Director Gilman, you have now had a chance to speak to the Alameda County Health Department Director.
And so, I was hoping you could share a bit about what you've learned from that.
And then, I do want to ask you some questions about the audit recommendations.
Yes.
Thank you.
Thank you for the opportunity, Councilmember and Mayor.
Through the City Manager, we did meet with the county or having regular meetings with the county as we move forward with the audit.
Regarding simply giving it back to them, we've determined with the county that it is our responsibility.
It's our responsibility to pay for it.
And so, if we did make that decision, it would be a contract.
They aren't necessarily jumping up and down at that idea, but are willing to discuss it.
And in fact, one of the things that we're doing while we go through this process is talking to them about implementing a contract with them for backup services.
So, if we do run into a situation where we fall behind, we have a very small staff.
So, it doesn't take very many vacancies for us to get behind.
And that's part of what happened to begin with.
So, the short answer is, yes, we're in communication as we rebuild.
We want to have our standards, our policies, our procedures very similar to theirs.
And we have talked about whether it would be viable or not.
Okay.
Thank you very much, Director Gilman.
And can you tell us more about the status of catching up on the 2023 inspections that we weren't able to do? I know the document on page 4 notes that we still have 124 to complete by December 31st.
Are we going to be able to do those? Yeah, we'll complete the overdue inspections for 2023, you know, as we promised.
I think the thing I want to be transparent about, though, is as we've gone through this, you know, we've done a really deep dive into the department.
We found a few things.
For example, a fee study hadn't been done in quite a while.
The fee study's almost complete.
One of the things that the fee study has shown us very clearly, and it's just simple math, is that we're not staffed appropriately to do the work in the department.
So, we're going to have to come back to you, and we'll have to figure out from a staffing and a finance standpoint and a policy standpoint, there's a lot of discussions and questions that we'll have to answer.
But it's really just a phenomenon that we've learned happens across the state.
Other environmental health directors call it the while you're out there syndrome, where we have staff that's out in the field, and while you're out there, for example, you can just do tobacco, you can just do noise, you can do, you know, these other functions.
And we've done that, but we're clearly mathematically not able to meet the level of quality that we want to.
And so, we're in the early stages of analyzing the fee study.
That'll be the vehicle that we'll use to have discussions, you know, about that.
And when I say quality discussions versus cost discussions for the city, just the best way to think about that is best practice is we do four inspections a year for high-risk facilities like nursing homes.
If we're going to continue, and that's a city policy decision, you can decide as a council that you want to do it six times.
You can decide that you want to do it one time, but there's a cost to it.
So, we're going to have to weigh that cost of maintaining that level of quality with, you know, with the current resources that we have.
Okay, thank you very much, Director Gilman.
I wanted to touch on the staffing issues.
I see, and I think our auditor had mentioned that you filled the vacant registered environmental health specialist position recently in October 2024, and we're in the process of hiring for the supervisor position.
But in the interim, we are able to contract with the California Association of Environmental Health Administrators to use temporary registered environmental health specialists.
It says in the short term.
I'm wondering, is that an option that could also be available in the longer term, just given our staffing challenges? Because if we have turnover, I just want to make sure we have a backup plan.
It sounds like we could explore the county as a backup, and what about this other option here with the California Association of Environmental Health Administrators? Yeah, we're exploring both of those options right now.
What we have to be careful of with the association is it's retired annuitants, and they can only work, you know, unspecified projects, and we were very fortunate.
We had a registered staff person that was familiar with our community, very seasoned, and was able to walk in and really just start working right away.
But to answer your question specifically, yes, we're exploring both of those options.
Okay.
Yes, I just want to encourage that.
I want to make sure that we have a backup plan so that we don't have a situation where the very high-risk facilities are not getting the attention and the inspections that they need.
And then finally, on the IT piece and the database, can you just give us an update on where we are with that? Yeah, we have been working with IT.
We're scheduled to implement our new system the first quarter of 2026.
There's a lot of groundwork that has to be done between now and then, including bringing in a consultant to help us map the current system.
And once that's done, then we can look at the last item on the auditor's recommendation was some sort of placard system that we could implement.
But again, if we do move in that direction, that would be an additional function, an additional cost that we'll have to consider when we get to that point.
Okay.
Yes, I want to express my support for the placard system.
I think we've all traveled to other places where we see the letter grade for the restaurant, and it gives the customer confidence that, yes, the restaurant has been inspected and it has passed.
So I hope we can get to that point, but I know we have a lot of work to do before we can build on what we have.
And in closing, I just want to note that this type of function often gets overlooked.
This is a core basic service that our residents are expecting, that our health care facilities, you know, health facilities, food facilities, restaurants, food trucks, that the foods that they consume at these places, that they are safe to consume.
And I want to just say that we need to focus on our core services and make sure that they are being delivered well.
And so, you know, I just want to say, Director Gilman, I appreciate the work that's been done, and I hope that you will come to me or the full council if there are resources that you need or further support so that we can ensure that the public has confidence that this basic public health function is being done, and it's being done to the standard that it should be done.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Absolutely.
Thank you.
Council Member Humbert.
Yes, thank you, Madam Mayor.
And I want to join in all of the comments that Council Member Kesarwani just made.
It is a core function to provide assurances, to do the work to be able to provide assurances to our residents and to visitors that restaurants, health care facilities that they are patronizing or, you know, patients in, for example, are safe and, you know, I think it's really just critical.
There's another sort of sub-issue, and I don't think, well, first of all, I want to mention that I think I'd really love to see the work speeded up the first quarter of 2026 is a long way away, and in the meantime, you know, we really need to, we need to really be able to deliver these services and assurances.
But one sub-issue has to do with the ability to find out a restaurant's health score, for example, and right now, as I understand it, you have to log in to get it, and I don't think people who are going out to a restaurant are going to take the time necessarily to log in to find out what a particular restaurant's health score is, so I'm wondering if there's some way in the interim, immediately, as soon as possible, to open the data portal so that people can simply look at the website and find out very quickly what the health score of a particular restaurant is.
Is that something we can do more quickly, Director Gilman? We can certainly explore it with our IT department.
It's really, you know, like all of this, it's a matter of resources and priorities, so my boss is sitting in the room, and we will definitely explore it and report back.
Thank you.
I appreciate that.
Thank you.
Moving on to Council Member Tracob.
Thank you so much, Director Gilman, for just being so transparent about what has happened and what hasn't happened yet in the wake of this report, and of course your very hard work to expeditiously try to address all of these audit findings.
I co-sponsored Council Member Cassavani's item, and I'm very appreciative of the line of questioning that my colleagues have provided.
I wanted to just sign on to, or associate myself with, several of the comments on the dais that have already been made.
I believe that, I too believe that this is foot inspections, and doing them well, that is a critical function of city government, and so I'm fully invested in the success of this program, and anything that we can do as a council to ensure that you have the appropriate resources to complete this task, I would certainly support.
With that, I wanted to really encourage you to look at what data may be made available to the public right now.
I agree that placards with letter grades is, I think, the most accessible methodology that I know of, and it's very transparent.
It's right in front of you.
You see it as a consumer, and you can make the decision you're going to make.
So, any opportunity to do that, I recognize that there are limited resources, of course, but at the end of the day, this is something that other jurisdictions do, and we should at least be doing that.
I did want to ask if you could comment on what other technologies could be employed, such as the use of AI, not to displace anyone from doing this important work, but rather to help them make sure that these overdue inspections, that the backlog is cleared.
Well, our AI's name is Kelly, and she's developed a spreadsheet for us.
We've actually gone back backwards and had to go back to plain old-fashioned Excel spreadsheets just to track everything while we get the database up and fixed.
So, we haven't explored AI solutions for that at this point, but I know the city is actually considering an AI policy and looking at that, and would definitely be open to considering that as we move forward.
Thank you.
And my other question is, and you started with this, Director Gilman, if I understood correctly, you talked about how it's often the case that we get focused on a particular issue and resolving it, and other things come up that just cannot be focused on because of a scarcity of resources.
To what an extent are there opportunities, can you touch a little bit further on opportunities to be able to address multiple things that may be in need of inspections? You mentioned noise, for instance, at the same time that perhaps food inspections may also be needed.
To what an extent can there be alignment on inspections, and are there opportunities for multi-craft specialists to work together so that it's also more predictable for the businesses themselves, and inspectors are coming to them once a year or whatever is appropriate, not multiple times a year for multiple things? Yeah, I don't think we're far away from that sort of schedule, so the businesses know what to expect.
We are, as you said, we are staffing up.
The last position that we're trying to fill in the department is the supervisor.
We're working actually an offer on that right now.
We've also done some restructuring in the department so that in order to do a restaurant inspection, the staff are required to have a registered environmental health specialist or REHS.
We're currently working with our state association on some legislation to sort of make the trainee program and the testing process a little bit more user-friendly.
This is a statewide problem, and so CHEAC is our California Association of Healthcare Executives.
We have legislation right now that will work on trying to streamline that, make it a little bit easier, and extend the time so that we can have a larger candidate pool, but to your question specifically, we are looking at a trainee program so that we could have inspectors that were training that would want to stay with the city, but they could also do things that wouldn't require them to have the inspection.
So, for example, we have vector programs.
We have other things that don't require that high-level license, so we're trying to shift work away from the restaurant inspectors to look to other different positions and also trying to build sort of a pathway, a career path for folks to come to Berkeley and then stay with us.
So, yeah, reorganization, predictability in 2025, and then having, I call this across health, having people work at the top of their license, so using the license to do the work that we need them to do, and if we can have a technician or somebody else or a trainee do the other sorts of work, then we're going to work in that direction.
Thank you so much, Director Gilman.
I again just want to reiterate my appreciation to you and your team for turning around something that, you know, I actually had my doubts when this item first came to us back in the summer, but I also knew that if anyone could do it, it would be you and your team.
So, thank you so much and keep up the great work and look forward to the next update.
Thank you.
Council Member Bartlett.
Thank you, Madam Mayor, and Director Gilman, my comments will be brief, but there will be some brief, I guess, involved.
I would only add to my colleagues, I agree with everything that's said.
The letters make sense, but I will add this sense of urgency, if you'll permit me.
You know, the aircrafts that fell down the last couple of years, there were so many air accidents, they were a direct result of the Trump administration curtailing enforcement and inspection of the aviation industry.
They push for efficiencies and self-enforcement and often no enforcement, and so now we know that the DOGE agency is coming on to do this at scale, so we can anticipate on the food agriculture industry having many more issues that we need to be on top of to protect our residents.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Any other comments? Thank you so much, Director Gilman, for answering all of our questions and for being here this evening.
Do I have a motion? Do we have public comment? Well, we opened public comment already, actually, so..
Sorry, City Clerk, could you clarify for us what happened since it was an information item and there isn't particularly action to be taken? Right, there's no action listed with the item for the Council to take.
If the Council has completed its consideration tonight, then that concludes item 22, and we can move to the next thing on the agenda.
Okay, there is an additional public comment period, so I'd like to open public comment again.
For non-agenda matters.
For non-agenda matters, thank you.
Yes.
Go ahead.
Well, I guess that's sort of non-agenda if it's information, right? So, I just want to say logins only work online if people actually know that there's something online, so we need to have better education to the community to know that this health score information exists, and it certainly would help if even all the Council members and the Mayor place in their newsletter about these health scores being available online.
Secondly, in terms of prioritizing, it's a question of how something is prioritized.
Is it prioritized based on complaint triggering? Because some restaurants are going to get complaints, or some people complain, and other people don't complain.
There's always an issue when there's prioritizing.
And third, I want to state on coordination between different departments.
Council Member Trageb did touch on this slightly.
So, I have questions if you have, that if you're going to be doing restaurant inspections, there should also be this cross-referencing to Berkeley Fire Department calls.
So, we know if there's been a calls to a restaurant, for example, that there's smoke coming through the walls or something.
Secondly, I was thinking of the Fire Department.
I was thinking of vector control, if vector control has been to a particular site.
And so, I would want to see that coordination between departments.
Thank you.
Hi, everybody.
Russell Bates here.
I just wanted to mention something I got before I came in here tonight.
It was from BAD, Bay Area that divest.
A BDS victory, $32 million dollars, Elevated County divest from Caterpillar, Tree Palestine.
One of the things that this council needs to do, speaking of the courage that somebody mentioned earlier, and that is there needs to be some kind of resolution talked about, voted about, about divesting from the Zionist entity, calling for a ceasefire in Gaza.
The Zionist entity has been attacking Syria 300 times since Assad got out.
The U.S.
is attacking in Syria.
It seems like everybody's taking out on Syria right now.
But the most important thing is that there is something called the Greater Israel that the Zionist entity has been trying to get to for years, taking over territory there, expanding it.
Now, from the river to the sea is an expression that's used amongst Palestine supporters to recognize the Jordan River to the sea is part of Palestine.
It is Palestine.
And it needs to be recognized as such.
So there needs to be a ceasefire resolution brought forth, passed at some point by this city council.
Everybody else is doing it.
I mean, I'd always like to go along with the crowd and won't go along with Palestine.
It's not going along with the crowd, but it needs to be done.
Please find it within your hearts, within your minds, and re-Palestine.
Thank you very much.
Okay, and it looks like we have three folks on Zoom for non-agenda.
The first one is Chelise, or sorry, Chelsea.
Oh, that's all right.
And thank you for being patient.
I know that I was speaking on non-agenda items earlier.
I have some people from a non-profit.
It's their first time going to city council meetings, and I just want them to realize you can say things and it's all right.
As far as the food situation, please don't let bureaucracy tie that up or throw it online.
Just have a QRS code next to the placard.
Get some college students, and they're getting benefits.
And then we're also working with them as part of the community to make it easy.
And then now that I can talk about the non-agenda items, I would like to see a show of hands.
How many of you know.
Segment 5
What the Hawkins-Costa Act is.It's the Costa-Hawkins Act.
Yes, put that around.
You know what I'm saying.
Thank you so much.
But yes, the Costa-Hawkins.
All right, so this is something to really look into because there's a lot of these loopholes that the landlords had made.
And the big thing again, this is about the rent control staying with the physical unit.
And this is why we have a housing problem.
Because anytime someone moves out, the landlords are creeping that up by $500, by $1,000.
And there's no real necessary, there's not really a limit on it.
And that would help people in our community be able to move if they want to move and not feel tied into some crazy old decrepit building or unit that hasn't been repaired and they're too afraid to move because of rent control.
We need rent control that is transparent, that moves with, that doesn't move, it stays with the unit.
Also, if your landlords are pretending like they're trying to sell them as condos and you are renting, you lose rent control.
If you are in a single family house, you don't have rent control with this act.
This was a huge, huge loophole that legislators who are landlords created.
And there's one more that you can do.
Oh, and then if you live in a building and your landlord decides to move in, you 100% lose all your rent control.
So please take some time to inform yourself more about this and put this on the agenda as soon as humanly possible.
This is a very big deal for people in our community and honestly across California.
Thank you for the time.
Okay, next is a phone number ending in 937.
Hi, can you hear me? Yes.
Okay, I'm going to start crying now because you know what, that's what I've been doing all day.
So I figured that you guys should share it with me because everybody else that's there in your audience there, they've all had to listen to me all day crying.
What are you guys going to do? What are you people going to do about Peter Radu? I want to know what you're going to do about him.
I mean, what is his thoughts? You're right there, aren't you? What are you going to do about Peter Radu? Mr.
Gilman, you know, Mr.
Gilman, what are you going to do? The auditor, what are you going to do? What are you people going to do about him? He's out of control.
I mean, I'm in fear.
I am in so much fear.
And I have SCAD, spontaneous coronary artery dissection.
I'm under strict orders from my doctors, seven different specialists, to not be under extreme emotional stress.
How in the hell can I not be under extreme emotional stress? I've been left out here for three years.
Three years, I'm 60 years old.
And nobody's doing anything about anything.
Somebody needs to do something about him.
And I'm not kidding you.
They need to do something about him.
I mean, people are killing themselves because of that man.
He is a monster that hides behind a mask.
And I'm telling you right now, the mask that you guys see him wearing is not the mask that we all see him wearing.
You need to get real with this, because that is unacceptable.
67-year-old woman.
I mean, give me a break, 76-year-old woman.
Whatever, I'm 60.
Okay? It doesn't even matter.
What matters is that he's wrong.
He is not.
He should be forced to wear a body cam if you're going to let him continue to work in that position.
Just like he should, so he can be held accountable.
What he does to people is wrong.
And it's cruel.
And it's evil.
Pure evil.
And somebody needs to do something about him.
Please conclude your comments.
Thank you.
All right.
Guess what? My minute's up.
Done.
Thank you.
Okay.
Next is a phone number ending in 2-1-1.
Caller with the phone number.
Hi.
Yes, hi.
Thank you again.
And, again, welcome to our neighbor, Ishi.
What I, again, did and city council did in the last four years is a crime.
Not a crime against our company.
Again, it's the people of Berkeley.
Even people in the Bay Area.
Nobody laughs at those kind of business.
We do.
We do as much as $20 million a year.
One second.
Let me finish.
Let me finish.
Let me finish.
We need to have you stop and manager, whatever your name is, you always promise to recall.
You never called.
You make a lot of money.
At least justify the money you make.
Justify.
Block that item C in your consent agenda and save the city from multimillionaire suit.
And many people in Berkeley are going to join our suit.
You, Mayor, behave differently.
Again, we're the loser.
We need a winner to run this city.
Thank you.
Okay, Mayor, that completes the non-agenda public comment.
Thank you.
And I just wanted to make a comment to Chelsea who spoke earlier about Costa Hawkins.
I wanted to let you know that that's not something that we can change on the local level.
So I do encourage you to reach out to your state representatives to be heard on that matter.
Just want to make sure you're going to the correct person.
So now that we're done with public comment, I'd like to entertain a motion to adjourn.
Motion to adjourn.
Second.
Okay.
Yes, seeing no objection, I'd like to adjourn our meeting.
Yes, everybody recorded as aye.
And we are adjourned.
Thank you all.
Thank you so much.
Thank you.